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Great write up! Curious what magazine this was published in. What a cool opportunity!

“The film was considered a comedy-drama in the 1980s and in many ways, the humor was the antidote to the weighty gravitas of the big “C.” Nowadays, such a depiction would be verboten.”

Now I want to watch Terms of Endearment again - haven’t seen it since I was a kid. Humor was how we coped with the weight of Bryan’s cancer diagnosis and treatment.

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Thanks Jen. I still cried at “Terms of Endearment” but with Shirley MacLaine and Jack Nicholson, there was also quite a bit of humor in it too. And the laughter was therapeutic. There are shows that have cancer in them that can do the dark humor and drama well. Actually “The Big C” from like at least ten years ago on Showtime with Laura Linney is a good example. As part of my research I also looked into what films (if any) that portray prostate or colon cancer. For the latter there were a few - all female portrayals. But Kate Hudson was in one and Andie MacDowell in another more recent one. https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/23/movies/my-happy-ending-review.html

Should we be alarmed at the lack of male representation?

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